Drone Striker – PSVR | Review

Ah, the 90’s, a time when I used to waste loads of money chucking coins into light gun games like The House of the Dead and Time Crisis, I had always hoped a game like that would spring up on VR and it finally looks like it has.

Drone Striker is an on-rails VR shooter much like the 2 games I mentioned above, it doesn’t have too much of a story, to be honest, some rogue AI that was developed to protect mankind has taken up arms against its creators and is set on destroying mankind. The game doesn’t really attempt to add any more to that and the only interaction you have that can be considered story come at the end of a level as you move onto the next.

This was likely not deliberate but the few lines the voice actors say are awful but that’s fine as it could just be seen as a little nod to the House of the Dead which shared this trait (as did most light gun games if my memory isn’t letting me down)

The game itself is very short, having only 3 levels to play through, and there is not a lot of variety in the enemies you face or the character designs. The graphics look like a remaster of a game from the late 90s early 00’s but I still enjoyed it nonetheless, because the gunplay is spot on it really has that feel of an arcade light gun game.

You can play the game with a controller, a single motion control, or a sharpshooter control. I used a motion control and the accuracy was spot on, it was possibly the most accurate shooter I have played in VR as picking off targets in the game just felt so natural. As you go along you find various boxes scattered around that upgrade your weapon set allowing for faster fire and better secondary fire, however, you don’t get new weapons but since the shooting was so much fun I never cared about this.

It really did capture the feel of the old light gun style arcade games and I would really love to see what Sega or Namco could do with their classic games in VR. Drone Striker does a great job of scratching that itch, it’s a shame the game can be finished in under 2 hours as the only other thing to do in the title after that would be to replay it on the harder difficulty as there are no other modes or challenges to play through.

Final Impressions

Drone striker is a great game that’s really enjoyable to play, the only thing dragging down the score I’m giving is really its length meaning some may not find it great value for money.